The Black Barque: Newfoundland’s Ship of the Dead
Newfoundlanders know their share of ghost stories.
Every bay has tales of phantom lights or strange ships that vanish in the mist. Most of them, I can shrug off without a second thought, but there’s one story I can’t shake. It’s the tale of a black-sailed ship, said to haunt the waters off St. John’s.
She’s been called the Black Barque. She’s been called the Black Frigate. But names don’t matter.
What matters is this: you best pray you never see her.
The Black Barque
It started in 1875, according to the old sailor who shared the tale. He was aboard a cargo ship, returning to Newfoundland from Spain.
By his recollection, it was a calm summer night, the kind of night that should have promised safe, uneventful passage. The sea was quiet and the air, cool and still. As they neared the Avalon, thin ghostly fingers of fog appeared on the horizon.
For most of the sailors, who were used to the Grand Banks, the fog was hardly worth mentioning. Still, something about the shifting grey mist of sowed a sense of unease — most of all, for the man on watch.
The Watchman
The watchman’s job was clear enough: catch sight of what others might miss — drifting debris, ships, and all other manner of peril.
Fog didn’t make the job easier; and this fog in particular was challenging: it was almost alive. Where ever he looked it seemed to thicken, hiding the horizon. It moved with him, anticipating his gaze, seeming to block the very spot he needed to see. In all his years of sailing he’d never seen anything like it.
He felt his heart quicken.
Overhead the stars still sparkled. To either side of the boat the horizon was clear. But forward — forward there was nothing. The line between sea and sky had been swallowed whole by this twisting grey void.
He strained to pierce it, but the harder he looked, the more the fog seemed to press back.
Soon even the sounds were gone — the waves, the wind, the creak of the timbers were all smothered by the thundering of his heart.
Something was out there, ahead of them. He was sure of it.
And whatever it was, it was staring back.
The Visions
Suddenly the fog seemed to erupt.
It was as if it had decided that if he wanted to see what lay ahead, it would show him.
Instead of open sea, he saw a world in flames.
Houses and churches collapsed in fire. Figures ran in the ominous glow, their mouths open in silent screams. Then they became hollow-eyed shapes, drifting through burnt streets.
Then all dissolved into white, endless snow.
Men trudged across the ice, bent with exhaustion. One by one they faltered. One by one they fell. One by one they were buried where they lay, their eyes staring upward until the snow sealed them in.
Then flashes of fire again. Not of hearth or home — something greater, something cruel. Young men torn apart in smoke and flame. Their bodies falling into darkness before he could make sense of what he was seeing.
The watchman crumpled to the deck.
It was as if he had lived a thousand lifetimes in the span of a single breath. There had been no chance to turn away. No moment to steel himself. The visions struck like the blows of a hammer. Merciless. Unrelenting.
He knew only one thing: every fire, every frozen corpse, everything he’d seen — lay in their path.
The Ship Dead Ahead
Clutching the rail, he dragged himself upright. His legs buckled, but his eyes stayed fixed forward. And there it was — a shadow, cutting through the fog.
A ship, black as night, was bearing down on them.
The mist closed around it again.
He lunged for the bell and struck it with all the strength he had. The clang rang out, jolting the crew from their bunks.
The watchman pointed frantically. “There! Dead ahead! A boat!”
For a long, breathless moment, the crew stared into the mist. The watchman’s voice cracked with terror, as begged them to see. But no matter how hard they looked, the sea ahead lay blank and shifting. No lights, no masts, and no sign of any boat at all.
As strange as the night had been, the watchman knew what he’d seen.
The crew muttered under their breath. Some cursed the watchman for rousing them, for the panic. Then someone laughed, and soon relief began to spread — enough that a few turned back toward their bunks.
And then, then the mist shuddered.
At first, it was only grey shifting within grey. Then the lines hardened — angles, height, and the impossible bulk of a huge hull appeared. In a heartbeat, it was upon them: a black barque. Towering and terrible.
It looked as if it were dragged from the ocean floor. Her timbers were eaten by rot. Her masts rose like jagged spikes that seemed to claw at the sky. What remained of her black sails hung in tatters.
Still, she glided forward.
Beneath the bowsprit, a figurehead emerged — a grotesque skeleton, its jaw hanging wide in a silent scream. In one fleshless hand, a spear was raised to the sky, as though a victory had been claimed.
Even the most hardened sailors staggered back.
It was like nothing they’d ever seen, and worse was yet to come.
As the barque drew close, shadows seemed to stir at midship. Figures crawled across the rigging, moving like flies on a corpse. Whatever they were, they were no longer of this world.
As they came into focus, it was more horrible still.
In front of them appeared skeletons; bones wrapped in parchment-thin skin. Their joints bent at unnatural angles. Despite their condition, they worked — hauling lines, turning winches, moving across the deck in a steady rhythm, like some sort of machine.
They made no sound. But one by one, their decaying faces turned toward the watchman. Empty eye sockets fixed on him. Their jaws worked in a slow rhythm, as though they were laughing.
And then — just as quietly as they appeared — they were gone.
The Black Barque had slipped back into the mist.
Back in St. John’s
The watchman was never the same. By the time they made port in St. John’s, he’d fallen into silence. Within days, he was gone. Dead. They buried him beneath a small wooden cross on the Southside of the harbour.
But what he saw that night did not die with him.
Seventeen years later, the first of his visions came to pass. The Great Fire of 1892 — the city’s houses and churches collapsed in flame, just as he’d seen.
And there were whispers of a black-sailed ship, drifting outside the harbour just before it happened.
Years later, another vision struck true. In 1914 the men of S.S. Newfoundland were stranded on the open ice in blizzard conditions for two days and without any shelter. 77 men froze to death. Some citizens of St. John’s swore the Back Barque had been outside the narrows as the Newfoundland departed.
Again and again: before disaster befalls Newfoundlanders, the ship has been seen, and the story is told. Many more times, no doubt, she’s been glimpsed and dismissed — and her connection to a wreck, a storm or disaster goes unrecorded.
But those who’ve seen her have no doubt. The horrible sinking feeling she leaves in here wake is not easy to forget. She is out there, always. And will forever be. She sails the tides and time leaving nothing but destruction in her wake.
The Watchman
As for the watchman… well most believe he stared too hard into her darkness.
And now she’s claimed him as one of her own. He sails aboard the Barque, his boney-hands gripping the rail, watching from the fog and waiting.
So when the sun sets and the shadows grow long, think twice about gazing out to sea, you may find someone looking back
And if his eyes meet yours, well… it’s best not to think about it.
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Olde St. John's : stories from a seaport city, Frank Galgay & Michael McCarthy, Flanker Press, 2001
Some superstitions and traditions of Newfoundland : a collection of superstitions, traditions, folk-lore, ghost stories, etc., P.J. Kinsella, 1919
